Ghana GDP growth slows to 0.3%

Ghana's economic growth slowed sharply to 0.3 percent year-on-year in the third quarter of 2013 due to a slowdown in the mining sector, compared with 1.6 percent growth in the third quarter of 2012, Ghana statistics office said on Wednesday.

The country's economy grew 6.1 percent the second quarter. Ghana government projects 2014 growth of 8 percent in part due to exports of gold, cocoa and oil and the country is rated as Africa's brightest prospects because of its stable democracy and sustained growth.


But a sharp fall in global gold prices in 2013 has affected production in that sector, the statistics office said.


“Most of the declines came from the mining and quarrying sector, especially the drop in gold prices that heavily affected production,” said government statistician Philomena Nyarko said.

“We also experienced some down time at the Jubilee field so that affected overall growth,” Nyarko told a news conference, referring to planned maintenance work at the offshore field that is the country's main producer.


Ghana's annual producer price inflation rose to 15.3 percent year-on-year in December from a revised 13 percent in November, the statistics office said.